Lest Canada’s Media Chains Forget – Herb Gray Was Also A Strong Voice For Protecing The Health Of Our Great Lakes

 By Doug Draper

Some of you may know that Herb Gray – a former Canadian cabinet minister and deputy prime minister from an era when politics was less partisan and mean-spirited than it seems to be now – died this past April 21^st in his hometown of Windsor, Ontario at age 82.

Herb Gray, speaking at one of many events as Canada’s International Joint Commission co-chair. Photo courtesy oof the IJC

 What many may not know is that in recent years, Herb Gray was still working very actively as the Canadian co-chair on the International Joint Commission – the official Canada-U.S. watchdog body for caring for the country’s shared waters, including our precious Great Lakes. 

Five years ago this coming June, Gray joined a gathering of Canadian and U.S. signatories, and environmentally minded groups from all around the Great Lakes basin in our Niagara area to celebrate the 100^th anniversary of Canada-U.S. Boundary Waters Treaty – a treaty that created the International Joint Commission and the first binational agreement of its kind in the world for protecting the environmental health of shared waters.

While Gray and the IJC were here, they hosted a whole afternoon and evening of town hall sessions where environmental groups from here and around the Great Lakes could raise their concerns and what they felt should be done to address some of the more pressing threats facing these largest of all fresh bodies of water in the world.

You want to know how many members of the local media in Niagara, from either side of the border showed up at these sessions, none. I was there because at the time, I was working for a Canadian consulate office on communications for the 100^th anniversary ceremonies, and I was asked to come to these sessions to accept some kind of long-time achievement award for my past years as an environment reporter covering Great Lakes issues. So I was not in an uncompromising position to cover the town hall. 

But I don’t mind saying that when I accepted that nice award from the IJC, I used it as an opportunity to say too those in attendance that I thought it was disgraceful that none of the by-then corporate owned media organizations in the region could spare a reporter to cover dozens of individuals and organizations making presentations to the IJC about issues of concern in our Great Lakes. I noted that it is fine to come before the commission to express your concerns, but if there is no media here to pass them on to the public at large; it is like a tree falling in the forest with no one around to hear it.

At the same time, I find it interesting that the mainstream media in Canada today, as much as it carried obituaries on Herb Gray as a federal member of parliament, hardly mentioned that he was a co-chair of the International Joint Commission – a role he used to warn about far too many environmental stresses still facing these vital water bodies.

I continue to wonder how many – if any at all – working in the mainstream today care enough about environmental issues to give them the coverage they deserve. How many know what the International Joint Commission is or what its importance is a binational body for speaking out for the shared waters of Canada and the United States.

Does anyone even bother to teach our children about these serious matters facing their future in school?

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